Arthur Rubinstein - Famous Cosmopolitan Pianist Arthur Rubinstein Famous Cosmopolitan Pianist Arthur Rubinstein was a Polish-American pianist, who was hugely famous during his long and productive life. His charming personality, love of life, and strong, beautiful playing have made him a piano legend. Rubinstein's Life He was born in Lodz, Poland, in 1887. His father wanted him to be violinist. But young Arthur trampled his violin to pieces, demonstrating his lack of enthusiasm for the instrument. So his father gave up and let him study piano instead. His skills improved and he began touring as a young adult (usually on fake passports). His first American tour didn't go very well, but he managed to start a small career as a performer around Europe. During the First World War he worked as a translator in London. Afterwards, he became somewhat famous in Europe and South America, and began his extravagant lifestyle of travel and socializing. When he was in his 40s, he stopped touring for a while to work on his playing. He hadn't really practiced thoroughly enough when he was young, and cracks were showing in his keyboard technique.

So he shut himself away and studied music scores, working on his art until he got even better. Let that be a lesson to all the young pianists out there - you can fix your mistakes after you become a world-famous concert performer! Rubinstein sensed the upcoming war in Europe in 1939 and escaped to the United States. He arrived there at a good time, when the best pianists of the day were finishing up their careers. By filling the gap they left Arthur Rubinstein started earning a reputation as the "greatest" (a term he hated) pianist in the world. Unusually for a "blockbuster" pianist, he hardly taught at all. Sure, he helped up-and-coming pianists out a few times and gave the odd masterclass. But he spent his whole life recording and performing, until only his failing eyesight at the age of 89 stopped him. What a passion! He lived a glamorous life floating in the highest circles of society. His spectacular playing and charming, old-world personality made him a fascinating, popular socialite. Arthur Rubinstein was a sophisticated man of the world, well-traveled and well-read, fluent in nine languages.

He knew Picasso, Einstein, Stravinsky, Hemingway, and a boatload of other kings, aristocrats, industrialists, and intellectuals. He was a complete optimist with an unconditional love of life. He once said "Happiness is never a matter of conditions. It comes from the ability to be happy. We must live life fully, and enjoy life." Good advice! He thought that a piano virtuoso should also be an interesting character (like Franz Liszt) - he certainly lived up to this ideal! He was famous in America for his performances of Tchaikovsky's first piano concerto and Grieg's piano concerto . His interpretations of Chopin 's music were also highly esteemed. Rubinstein was Polish and extremely patriotic, like Chopin himself. I think this similarity allowed Rubinstein to give thoughtful and intelligent performances of Chopin's music which capture the composer's feelings about his homeland. There are actually quite a few really great historical recordings from the 1930s of Rubinstein playing Chopin Mazurkas and Scherzos. I'd recommend you take a look at them if you want to hear Rubinstein in his joyous prime. Here are two Rubinstein performances I really like.

I hope you enjoy them! Further below there's also a fascinating interview with Arthur Rubinstein, recorded when he was 90 years old. Chopin etude Opus 25 No. 1: Franz Liszt's Funerailles, a dark and gloomy piece. Listen to how Rubinstein paints dozens of mournful colors using the keyboard: Interview Part 1: A good introduction to Rubsintein's playing is this collection of Chopin recordings: You may also be interested in famous pianists like Vladimir Horowitz or Dinu Lipatti . Chopin: Nocturnes by Arthur Rubinstein on Apple Music 9 Items iTunes Review Borrowing the form “nocturne” from the Irishman John Field, Chopin elevated it to a level of poetry and imagination that makes each miniature a masterpiece. This is salon music raised to high art, and Chopin presents his interpreters with colossal challenges, both musical and technical. Few pianists were as associated with Chopin’s music as his compatriot Arthur Rubinstein: Chopin’s music winds through his career like a river, drawing out ever more perfect performances.

This set of the nocturnes, Rubinstein’s last recording of the works in a long life, has a tenderness, simplicity and clear-eyed lack of sentiment. Customer Reviews by bennedy1 Love this, I know some people can’t stand rubato, but this is a definitive performance of some of the greatest Romantic pieces ever written Biography Born: 28 January 1887 in Lódz, Poland Genre: Classical Years Active: '10s, '20s, '30s, '40s, '50s, '60s, '70s Warm, lyrical, and aristocratic in his interpretations, Artur Rubinstein performed impressively into extremely old age, and he was a keyboard prodigy almost from the time he could climb onto a piano bench. At age three he impressed Joseph Joachim, and by the age of seven he was playing Mozart, Schubert, and Mendelssohn at a charity concert in his hometown. In Warsaw, he had piano lessons with Alexander Róóycki; then in 1897 he was sent to Berlin to study piano with Heinrich Barth and theory with...

Top Albums and Songs by Arthur Rubinstein 1. Chopin: Nocturnes by Arthur Rubinstein on Apple Music 9 Items iTunes Review Borrowing the form “nocturne” from the Irishman John Field, Chopin elevated it to a level of poetry and imagination that makes each miniature a masterpiece. This is salon music raised to high art, and Chopin presents his interpreters with colossal challenges, both musical and technical. Few pianists were as associated with Chopin’s music as his compatriot Arthur Rubinstein: Chopin’s music winds through his career like a river, drawing out ever more perfect performances. This set of the nocturnes, Rubinstein’s last recording of the works in a long life, has a tenderness, simplicity and clear-eyed lack of sentiment.

Customer Reviews Born: January 28, 1887 in Lódz, Poland Genre: Classical Years Active: '10s, '20s, '30s, '40s, '50s, '60s, '70s Warm, lyrical, and aristocratic in his interpretations, Artur Rubinstein performed impressively into extremely old age, and he was a keyboard prodigy almost from the time he could climb onto a piano bench. At age three he impressed Joseph Joachim, and by the age of seven he was playing Mozart, Schubert, and Mendelssohn at a charity concert in his hometown. In Warsaw, he had piano lessons with Alexander Róóycki; then in 1897 he was sent to Berlin to study piano with Heinrich Barth and theory with... Top Albums and Songs by Arthur Rubinstein 1.

Best of Chopin by Artur Rubinstein - Arthur Rubinstein | Songs, Reviews, Credits | AllMusic Best of Chopin by Artur Rubinstein AllMusic Rating google+ AllMusic Review by Blair Sanderson Not since the days of Ignace Jan Paderewski had a pianist been more closely associated with the music of Frédéric Chopin than Arthur Rubinstein , for many of his admirers the composer's greatest interpreter in the 20th century. As passionately patriotic as his two great Polish predecessors, Rubinstein nonetheless became regarded in the public imagination as an aloof, aristocratic figure whose playing was cool, precise, and elegant. Yet this image is belied by Rubinstein 's actual playing, which was quite vigorous, urgent, and even explosive, well into his eighties.

This twofer from RCA Red Seal presents some of Rubinstein 's best-loved recordings from 1946 to 1972, featuring the two piano concertos on the first disc, and offering a sampling of the most popular solo piano works on the second CD, such as the Polonaise in A flat major, "Héroique," the Fantaisie-Impromptu in C sharp minor, the Nocturne in E flat major, and the Waltz in D flat major, "Minute," among others. The wide range of Rubinstein 's expression can be judged best from these short works, because the selection covers music of quiet intimacy, heroic bravado, and everything in between. The sound of these recordings is a little variable, as might be expected from their vintage, and the reproduction is poorest in the recording of the Prelude in D flat major, which is the oldest. Even so, Rubinstein 's legacy is so important and his interpretations are so influential, the occasional sound problems are insignificant. This album is recommended for any who would like to gain a better appreciation for Chopin , Rubinstein , and piano music in general.

Track Listing - Disc 1 1000+ images about ♫ Classical Music ♫ on Pinterest | Orchestra, Swan lake and Songs ... Rhapsody in Blue (1925 piano roll) ... George Gershwin, fused with the sound of the Columbia Jazz Band See More Arthur Rubinstein Dies in Geneva at 95 Arthur Rubinstein Dies in Geneva at 95 By THE NEW YORK TIMES Arthur Rubinstein, one of the greatest pianists of the century, died quietly in his sleep at his home in Geneva yesterday. He was 95 years old. For about 85 of those years he had been playing the piano in public, and he lived to see himself win the highest acclaim. He started at the age of 3, made his debut shortly thereafter, and was still playing until about five years ago. In his youth he was eclipsed by such giants as Sergei Rachmaninoff and Josef Hofmann. But as the pianists of an older generation died, and as Mr. Rubinstein went on from strength to strength, he became the most popular pianist before the public and the most respected. His only rival was Vladimir Horowitz. In his autobiography, Mr. Rubinstein conceded that Mr.

Horowitz was the better pianist but not the better musician. Mr. Horowitz, however, was absent from the public from 1952 to 1965, and in those years Rubinstein had no real rival. Idolized All Over the World Possible competitors, such as Sviatoslav Richter, did not play that often in the West, and the legendary, eccentric Arturo Benedetti Michelangeli gave relatively few concerts. Mr. Rubinstein had the international field pretty much to himself, and was idolized all over the world. In the pantheon of 20th-century pianists, Mr. Rubinstein's place is assured as one of the titans. With his remarkable technique, golden tone and musical logic, with the elan he brought to his interpretations, with his natural, unforced and unflurried style, he was unique - as, indeed, every great artist is. What Mr. Rubinstein offered, above all others, was the ability to transmit the joy of music. ''What good are vitamins?'' Mr. Rubinstein demanded when he was asked, at the age of 75, to explain his youthful vivacity and fire.

''Eat a lobster, eat a pound of caviar - live! If you are in love with a beautiful blonde with an empty face and no brains at all, don't be afraid. Marry her! Live!'' The great pianist conscientiously applied the prescription to himself, and everything he did was con brio. There was dash to his rich mode of life, just as there was to his making of sumptuous music. From his earliest to his latest days he was the embodiment of the grand manner. Even at an age when most musical artists slow down, he was giving concerts on an average of one every three days; he was recording furiously out of his vast repertory; he was the life of innumerable parties and luncheons; he was the irrepressible talker and raconteur; he was, ineffably, Rubinstein. The supreme and serious musician that most Americans knew was Rubinstein since 1937, the year of his historic reappearance at Carnegie Hall that marked a new dedication to his art. ''It is said of me that when I was young I divided my time impartially among wine, women and song,'' he remarked afterward. ''I deny this categorically.

Ninety percent of my interests were women.'' There was an element of exaggeration to this comment, but it was certainly true that the post-1937 Rubinstein was a mature artist. His special fusion of Romanticism and intellectualism caught the public fancy. Audiences could not hear enough of him; his concerts were standing-room only; his recordings sold in the millions; he performed all over the world at fees of $6,000 and more a concert, then the highest fee for any artist before the public. Chopin a Specialty Rubinstein moved with confident ease through a repertory (''my musical valise'') that started with Mozart, proceeded through Beethoven and the entire 19th century and wound up with such moderns as Heitor Villa-Lobos, Igor Stravinsky and Karol Szymanowski. Chopin, however, was his specialty and it was a Chopinist that he was considered by many without peer. As superb an interpreter of Chopin as he was, he counted himself also as a Mozart man. He returned to Mozart ''on my knees'' in late life.

Undeniably, part of the Rubinstein manner (and mystique) was his pianistic pedigree, which went back to many legendary 19th-century musicians. Rubinstein's first big-name enthusiast was Joseph Joachim, the violinist friend of Brahms. His early piano training came from Karl Heinrich Barth, a pupil of Franz Liszt, who had been taught by Carl Czerny, who had in turn been a pupil of Beethoven. Rubinstein, moreover, drew personally from such titans as Camille Saint-Saens, Ignace Jan Paderewski, Eugene Ysaye, Claude Debussy, Cesar Franck, Artur Schnabel and Vladimir de Pachmann. Played 'Crowd Pleasers' In his youth Rubinstein tended to perform what he called ''the crowd pleasers'' - Tchaikovsky, Rachmaninoff and Liszt - and his piano belched fire. With maturity, however, he turned more and more to Chopin, his fellow Pole, whose compositions of delicate expression called for an artist who could make the piano breathe. Rubinstein was so spontaneous and exuberant that he declined to think of his artistry as work.

''I can play 10 hours,'' he remarked in his late 70's. ''I don't feel that making art should be called work. Work is something disagreeable that you have to do.'' That statement, like so many of Rubinstein's about himself, was true and not true; for this most gifted of pianists worked very hard by any other standards than his own to perfect and project his artistry, even if he liked to create the impression that it was all effortless, as it indeed sounded to audiences. In a recording session for RCA Victor Records, in Webster Hall here, he would play and replay a piece until he was satisfied that it was his best; and before a concert he would practice, particularly passages that he thought he might have difficulty with. Nothing less than perfection was tolerated. Practice for its own sake, however, was not Rubinstein's notion of how to extract music from the printed notes. ''I was born very, very lazy and I don't always practice very long,'' he said once. ''But I must say, in my defense, that it is not so good, in a musical way, to overpractice. When you do, the music seems to come out of your pocket.

If you play with a feeling of 'Oh, I know this,' you play without that little drop of fresh blood that is necessary -and the audience feels it.'' On another occasion he explained in his tumbling English his philosophy this way: ''At every concert I leave a lot to the moment. I must have the unexpected, the unforeseen. I want to risk, to dare. I want to be surprised by what comes out. I want to enjoy it more than the audience. That way the music can bloom anew. It's like making love. The act is always the same, but each time it's different.'' Happiness in Performance One of the elements of freshness in a Rubinstein concert was also the evident happiness with which he played. ''Don't tell Hurok'' - Sol Hurok, his impresario of many years - he admonished one interviewer, ''but I'd play the piano for nothing, I enjoy it so much.'' This was of the essence of the pianist's attitude toward life generally, which he expressed by saying: ''Happiness is to live.

It is the only happiness possible.'' This total joie de vivre undoubtedly lent a special quality to Rubinstein's music (''Music is not a hobby, not even a passion with me; music is me'') and lifted him above his contemporaries. Moreover, underneath his panache he possessed insight and a capacity for musical growth tht markedly enriched the work of his later years. For example, he recorded the Schumann ''Carnaval'' at 65; and when he recorded the piece 10 years later ''there was no question but that it was a better performance,'' in the opinion of Harold C. Schonberg, then The New York Times music critic. ''His colleagues consider him a miracle, geriatric experts mumble when they talk about him and nobody will put up much of an argument when he is called the greatest living pianist,'' Mr. Schonberg wrote on Rubinstein's 75th birthday.

He continued: ''Vladimir Horowitz may have a more glittering technique, Rudolf Serkin may have a better way with German music, Rosalyn Tureck more of an affinity for Bach, Sviatoslav Richter for Prokofiev and Scriabin, and Claudio Arrau may have a bigger repertory. ''But no pianist has put everything together the way Rubinstein has. Others may be superior in specific things, but Rubinstein is the complete pianist.'' Presence of Majesty To see and hear Rubinstein at a concert was to be in the presence of majesty. A 5-foot-8-inch figure resembling a cube on sticks in impeccable evening clothes strode briskly on stage and received the homage that his subjects' thunderous applause connoted. He bowed slightly from the waist, and his pearl-gray hair glistened in the stage lights and his blue eyes darted around the hall. Before the applause subsided, he seated himself on the piano bench and carefully draped the tails of his coat over its back. Then he raised his face, masked in concentration, until his nose tilted upward at a 45-degree angle. His back was erect. He kneaded his fingers.

He bowed his head for a moment as the last coughs died out and then he eased into the keyboard. Sometimes in playing he seemed about to overwhelm the instrument as he rose off the bench; other times, when the music was lyrical, he moved his arms and hands in graceful symmetry. His eyes appeared fixed on a distant object. ''I like to look up over the piano,'' he explained, ''so I can listen and follow the lines of the piece. Looking at your fingers for accuracy is too confusing. I'd rather miss a few notes than play by phrase instead of as a whole.'' Rubinstein's sound, or tone was elegant. One critic described it as ''a firm, clear, colorful sonority that is one of the miracles of 20th-century pianism.'' ''He simply cannot produce an ugly, forced or jagged sound no matter how heavily he comes down on the keyboard,'' this observer continued. ''As soon as his fingers touch the keys, one knows that the Old Master is at work; and the penetrating tone rolls out and fills the house.'' Ingredients of Tone The pianist himself did not know how to account for the distinctiveness of his tone.

Contributing to it, however, was his physique, considered perfect for a pianist. His torso was short and muscular; his arms were long, his biceps those of a blacksmith and his fists like a longshoreman's. He would spread his spatulate fingers whose tips were calloused from years at the keyboard, to encompass the 12 notes from C to G -two more than normal. Moreover, his pinkies were nearly as long as his index fingers, and his elongate thumbs extended downward at an obtuse angle. Another ingredient of Rubinstein was an unusually fine ear that, among other things, permitted him to spin music through his mind. ''At breakfast, I might pass a Brahms symphony in my head,'' he said. ''Then I am called to the phone, and half an hour later I find it's been going on all the time and I'm in the third movement.'' This phenomenon was the basis for a game Rubinstein's friends like to play with him, in which they would randomly name musical excerpts that he would then play. He was seldom stumped.

''Rubinstein is the only pianist you could wake up at midnight and ask to play any of the 38 major piano concertos,'' according to Edouard van Remoortel, the conductor. The pianist was usually labeled a Romantic, but that was an error, in the opinion of many critics. Mr. Schonberg, for example, wrote: ''Rubinstein today is called - mistakenly - a Romanticist. And he is - in relation to the younger pianists, just as he was a Classicist in relation to the older ones. Today's new style is represented by the young spit-and-polish pianists, who never hit a wrong note, who come to music with the utmost dedication and who all tend to sound alike.'' A Born Extrovert If Rubinstein had not been a pianist, his friends were certain that he could have made an enjoyable living as a stand-up comedian and raconteur. A born extrovert, he loved to meet people, to act out his stories and to tell them in the eight languages in which he was fluent - English, Polish, Russian, French, German, Italian, Spanish and Portuguese.

When he told a story, he performed all the roles with appropriate facial expressions and gestures -climbing atop a chair or table and beating time if the anecdote were about a conductor, or simpering coquettishly if it were about a young woman. Even lighting a cigar (he prudently laid in a big stock of Upmann's just before the United States break with Cuba) was an act worth watching. One of his stories concerned the time he and Albert Einstein played a violin and piano sonata. The physicist missed a cue in one passage and came in four beats late. They started again, and once more Einstein missed the cue. Rubinstein turned to his partner in mock exasperation and exclaimed ''For God's sakes, professor can't you even count up to four?'' In another Rubinstein story which he delighted to tell on himself, he was making a recording in Webster Hall when a porter in overalls carrying a pail and mop came up to the piano, watched silently and then asked, ''Do you do this professionally?'' Rubinstein always said that at this point he was for the only time in his life nonplussed.

In addition to a sensitive appreciation of the best in cigars, haute cuisine and wines, the pianist was a connoisseur of painting who was able to say, ''I knew Picasso before he was Picasso and I was Rubinstein.'' Apart from his Picassos, Rubinstein's collection was dominated by Vuillards, Chagalls and Dufys. Rubinstein's start in life was much more modest than his eventual eminence. Born in Lodz, Poland, on Jan. 28, 1887, he was the youngest of seven children of Ignace Rubinstein, a textile producer, and Felicia Heyman Rubinstein. (Late in life, Rubinstein became vain about his age, and advanced his birth date to 1889, according to those who knew him.) He took piano lessons at the age of 3, and at 4 he was performing in public and flourishing a calling card that read ''Artur the Great Piano Virtuoso.'' A little later, tired of being asked if he were a relative of the great Anton Rubinstein, he inscribed the words ''No Relation'' on the cards.

By the time he was 8 he had exhausted the teaching resources of the Warsaw Conservatory of Music and was sent to Berlin to perform for Joachim, the violinist. Impressed by the boy's precocity, the friend of Brahms and Schumann assumed responsibility for his study. He was indeed, the conductor at Rubinstein's Berlin debut at the age of 11. There followed recitals in Dresden, Hamburg, Warsaw (where he played under the baton of Emil Mlynarski, his future father-in-law) and a visit to Paderewski in Switzerland. Among Paderewski's guests was a Boston critic who brought Rubinstein to the attention of the Knabe Piano Company, which underwrote his first American tour in 1906. His showpiece was Saint-Saens's Concerto No. 2 in G for Piano and Orchestra, which he performed at Carnegie Hall. The tour lasted 75 concerts and it was not a critical success. He returned to Europe disheartened. He went back to school, so to speak, by playing in private for Paderewski. ''I just played and listened, and he would tell me little things,'' Rubinstein recalled.

He did not return to the concert stage until 1910. He lived in Paris, had a series of love affairs, became friends with artists and writers. ''I had, often, lobster and champagne, and often I had nothing,'' he said. ''Once I spent two days on a park bench because I could not pay my hotel bill. But I also had wonderful chamber music with Ysaye and Thibaud and Casals.'' Recitals for Allied Cause Back as a performer Rubinstein established himself in Europe as a top-ranking pianist. In the early part of World War I he gave recitals for the Allied cause. At that time he became so enraged with the German treatment of the Poles and the Belgians that he vowed never to appear in Germany, and he never thereafter did. A turning point in Rubinstein's career came in 1916, when he made a tour of Spain. It was a grand success. Four concerts stretched to 125. And from there he went to South America. ''They loved me for my improvised way of playing,'' he recalled. ''It was not really intentional with me, because I could not even then work out a conception and stick to it.

But to them it was a relief from what they called 'the pedants.' '' Convinced that he would now be a hit in the United States, he reappeared in Carnegie Hall in 1919, but his reception was lukewarm. ''When I played in the Latin countries they loved me because of my temperament,'' he said later. ''But when I played in England and America, they felt that because they had paid their money they were entitled to hear all the notes. I dropped too many notes in those days, and they felt they were cheated.'' Rebuffed but not chastened, he returned to Europe, where he divided his time between concerts and high living with the international set. He was as frequently sitting on the Riviera or palling around with Picasso, the Prince of Wales, an attractive woman or Ernest Hemingway as he was sitting before a concert grand. The late 20's were decisive for the pianist's later career. First, in 1928, he met 15-year-old Aniela Mlynarski, daughter of the Polish conductor. According to them both it was love at first sight, although they were not married until 1932.

Second, Rubinstein began recording. Third, he began to take stock of himself as an artist. The result was the end of his days as a playboy and intensive study and practice - six, eight, nine hours a day. In the process he brought discipline to his abundant temperament and intelligence to his grand manner. ''I didn't want my kids to grow up thinking of their father as either a second-string pianist or as a has-been,'' he remarked. Rubinstein's early recordings (now collectors' items) called renewed attention to him, and Mr. Hurok, his agent, persuaded him to have another go at the United States. When he made his reappearance at Carnegie Hall on Nov. 21, 1937, he was acclaimed as ''a giant who had transformed his joie de vivre into the strongest alloy of his music.'' It was the start of the love affair between American music lovers and Rubinstein that never thereafter abated. Moved to California In World War II he moved his family from Paris to Beverly Hills, Calif., where he ghosted at the piano for movie actors who played the roles of Schumann, Liszt, Brahms and others.

The films were ''I've Always Loved You'' (1946), ''Song of Love'' (1947), ''Night Song'' (1947), ''Carnegie Hall'' (1947) and ''Of Men and Music'' (1950), in which he appeared as himself. Meanwhile, Rubinstein toured the world - North Africa, China, Japan, Indonesia, Australia, Europe. In 1958 he returned to Warsaw after an absence of 20 years, and the audience cheered and applauded and brought him back from the wings 10 times after he played Chopin's ''Polonaise'' in A flat. ''He is considered on all levels a great pianist and a great Pole,'' an American in Warsaw reported recently. ''The Poles pay him the great compliment of considering him one of theirs malgre tout.'' Became U.S. Citizen Rubinstein became an American citizen in 1946 and moved to New York in the 1950's. As his career came to a halt, because of his extreme age and loss of sight, Rubinstein found time to concentrate on his autobiography, which he had promised to write for Alfred A.

Knopf many years previously. In 1973, the first volume, ''My Young Years,'' was published, and was followed in 1980 by ''My Many Years.'' In his last years his constant companion was his secretary, Annabelle Whitestone. His American audience had a chance to enjoy Rubinstein the man and the musician once more when he was interviewed on a 90-minute television special, as part of the ''Great Performances'' series, entitled ''Rubinstein at 90.'' The pianist's other honors included Commander of the Legion of Honor, officer of Portugal's Order of Santiago, Commander of the Chilean Republic and Commander of the Crown of Belgium's Order of Leopold I, and he wore Spain's Cross of Alfonso XII. In addition, he had the Bronze Medallion of the City of New York and the Gold Medal of London's Royal Philharmonic Society. He held honorary degrees from Yale, Northwestern, Brown and Rutgers. Mr. Rubinstein is survived by his wife, Aniela, of Paris, and four children, Eva, Paul, Alina A. and John A., all of Manhattan.

The School Receives Arthur Rubinstein Collection | The Juilliard School The School Receives Arthur Rubinstein Collection Author November 2007 At his special Juilliard master class on February 12, 1975, in Paul Hall, the great pianist Arthur Rubinstein was asked why he no longer performed in Germany. His response: “That is a sad question that I have answered too often. I don’t play in Germany because I have a great respect for the dead, for 100 members of my family killed by the Nazis.” Like many other Jews of his time, Rubinstein had a complicated relationship with the country that in World War II tragically destroyed his family’s life in Europe. While he never did concertize again in Germany following the war, Rubinstein presented emotional homecoming tours in his birthplace of Poland in 1958 and 1960. ﻿Arthur Rubinstein at a master class he gave at Juilliard on February 12, 1975.

(Photo by Peter Schaaf) ﻿Left to right: Dean Ara Guzelimian, Chairman Bruce Kovner, Alina Rubinstein, Eva Rubinstein, and Suzie Kovner examine materials from the Rubinstein collection. (Photo by Nan Melville) Body Perhaps the pianist could not have imagined that decades later the German government would make a gesture of reconciliation by returning music manuscripts seized from his Paris home during the war to his four children, Eva, Paul, Alina, and John. In an extraordinary act of generosity, the Rubinstein family has donated this wonderful collection to Juilliard, where it may finally be studied and preserved. The story of the 71 scores in Rubinstein’s collection is a fascinating tale of 20th-century political history. Recognizing the Nazi threat, Rubinstein, his wife, Nela, and their eldest children, Eva and Paul, left Paris for the United States in October 1939. The contents of their Paris apartment were seized by the Nazi agency Einsatzstab Reichsleiter Rosenberg, which was led by Alfred Rosenberg and charged with the task of confiscating Jewish property. The music section of the agency, Sonderstab Musik, was led by Dr.

Herbert Gerigk, author of the notorious Lexicon der Juden in der Musik, which listed Jewish musicians banned by the Nazis; as Gerigk stated in its preface, “We have succeeded in purging all Jewish elements from both our cultural life and our music life.” The Rubinstein collection was first sent to Berlin, and later confiscated by the U.S.S.R. The 71 Rubinstein scores donated to Juilliard were part of a collection returned by the U.S.S.R. to East Germany in 1958-59. Following the fall of the Berlin Wall and German reunification, the Prussian Cultural Heritage Foundation was charged with returning identifiable materials to their rightful owners. The discovery of the Rubinstein scores and their return to the family was due largely to the work of the Dutch musicologist Willem deVries, who provides fascinating detail of the activities of Rosenberg’s group in his 1996 book Sonderstab Musik: Music Confiscations by the Einsatzstab Reichsleiter Rosenberg Under the Nazi Occupation of Western Europe. The pianist’s younger daughter, Dr.

Alina Rubinstein, described the experience of seeing the scores when they were returned by the German government and the family’s decision to donate the collection to Juilliard: “For me in particular, looking at these scores I knew my father had once handled and brought to musical life revived a very personal as well as musical connection to him. I could imagine these sheets of music as they originally lived variously on the piano music-stand in our Paris living room (we recovered the house, emptied of all its contents, in 1953) and piled in stacks nearby as my father read through and studied them. They only became a ‘collection’ when the Nazis confiscated them to Germany in a single crate in 1940. My siblings and I ultimately agreed that The Juilliard School would be the safest, most appropriate, and most meaningful home for them. We knew these scores would be well-preserved in the new state-of-the-art Juilliard library. We wanted the scores to be available for study to those who would value them most, i.e.

young music students, as well as historians and researchers, who would also fully appreciate the unique history the collection has acquired since the music was taken from our Paris home in 1940. I am sure that my father would have been as glad as we are to know that they are ‘home’ now at Juilliard, which so strongly contributes to the artistic education and inspiration of future musicians and artists in New York and the world.” The collection itself is a treasure-trove of manuscripts, manuscript copies, and published editions of works connected to Arthur Rubinstein and the time in which he lived. Many of the scores bear dedications to him. Of special note are manuscripts of Villa-Lobos’s Rudepoêma and several works by Germaine Tailleferre, a member of Les Six . Rubinstein traveled extensively in Spain and in Latin America, and his collection includes a substantial number of works by Latin American composers, among them Carmargo Guarnieri and Ernesto Halffter.

(In his extensive biography of the pianist, author Harvey Sachs describes this part of Rubinstein’s career in a chapter titled “Latino from Lodz.”) On October 15, Juilliard held a special event in honor of the Rubinstein family donation, with three of the pianist’s four children in attendance: Eva, Paul, and Alina. (The pianist’s youngest son, actor John Rubinstein, was unable to attend due to a professional engagement.) We were also joined by Dr. deVries, who flew in from Amsterdam especially for the occasion. The evening included a musical performance by pianist Ran Dank, recipient of the 2007 Arthur Rubinstein Prize; violinist Itamar Zorman; and cellist Michal Korman. Their performance featured works closely associated with Arthur Rubinstein: the first movement of Brahms’s Piano Trio in B Major, Op. 8, which Rubinstein recorded in 1941 with Heifetz and Feuermann, and again in 1972 with Henryk Szeryng and Pierre Fournier; and Chopin’s Polonaise in A Flat, Op.

53 (“Heroic”) which Rubinstein performed and recorded to thunderous applause throughout his career. As I wrote to Alina Rubinstein when she first approached us about donating this remarkable collection, the fact that the scores survived at all and were returned to her family was a tribute to Rubinstein’s musical legacy and his role as a cultural ambassador. Juilliard is proud to give them a permanent home. More by Jane Gottlieb

Question: Which musical instrument is associated with Arthur Rubinstein?
Answer: Piano